China Finds Tibetan Nomad Guilty Over Lithang Protest

By Radio Free Asia
October 30, 2007

A court in the southwestern Chinese province of Sichuan has convicted of subversion a Tibetan nomad who called for the return of the Dalai Lama at a horseracing festival in August.

Ronggyal Adrak was tried at the Ganzi Autonomous Prefecture People's Court in Dartsedo (in Chinese, Kangding) on Monday, Oct. 29, on charges of seeking to "split" the country and subvert state power during a public meeting Aug. 1 in Lithang county, sources in Lithang told RFA's Tibetan service.

Ronggyal Adrak told the judge from the dock: "When I shouted 'Long live the Dalai Lama' and called for the release of Tibetan political prisoners, I was detained and then formally arrested."

"The main reason was that there is nobody in Tibet who does not have faith in, loyalty to, and the desire to see the Dalai Lama," he told the court. "On the contrary, the Chinese government sends out propaganda saying that the Tibetans inside Tibet have no desire to meet him and have lost faith in him."

"That is wrong, and we have no freedom to say so."

The judge told Ronggyal Adrak that his crimes were "very severe."

Responsible for protest

"You committed the crime of subverting the People's Republic of China. The Dalai Lama, for whom you called for a long life and his return to Tibet, is the same person who is conniving with different foreign leaders and organi-zations to split our country through a variete of means and methods," the judge said.

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